Will as Strong and Kingdom as Great
by BasicCourtesy
Summary: Sarah said the right words to get Toby back, but they weren't necessarily true. So the Labyrinth made them true. Sarah tries to create a kingdom while living the normal life she won. It's not going great.
1. An Empty Field

She's in an empty field. There's no shade to protect her from the sun and no one but herself to talk to, so her skin is raw and her throat is dry, but she keeps going in the direction her feet are pointed and reciting verse as it comes to mind.

The field has been empty for as long as she can remember. She can't ever remember a time where she wasn't walking upon dark soil and saw anything beyond the blank horizon and as the days passed, she tired of opening her eyes to the same sight.

With her eyes searching the distance and her feet dragging through the dirt, she hits something solid and tumbles to the ground. Without rising (she has no reason to get up) she twists on the ground to inspect what had tripped her.

There, peeking from the soil, she spots the iridescent shimmer of a large seed. She picks it up. And under it she spots another. She digs into the ground faster and pulls out seed after seed and piles them next to her. The hole is getting bigger, bigger than could be explained by her digging with just her hands and her passion for something other than endless walking, but she doesn't pay any attention. She keeps digging.

Someone has appeared at the edge of the hole she has dug and she hears them laughing and calling her names, but she ignores them and continues to dig. She has to keep digging.

She digs until no more seeds appear and dozens of beings have appeared on the edge of the now distant cliff, and then she stops and looks around her.

She's in an empty field. There is no shade to protect her from the sun and no one she wants to talk to, but somewhere in that blank expanse there is a crater she dug and a small mountain of colorful seeds she harvested.

Since completing the Labyrinth and getting Toby back several weeks ago, Sarah had been trying to apply the lessons she had learned there in her everyday life. However, there was a drawback- she was fifteen and it was unfair for everyone to expect her to fix everything by herself.

For the first couple days Sarah acted the perfect daughter. She did her chores promptly, she made sure to remember curfew, she bathed Merlin even if he still had to stay in the garage, and she watched Toby without a single complaint.

Her resolution to take nothing for granted was tested by Irene commenting to her father that there must be something that Sarah wants, because lord knows she wouldn't be so considerate otherwise. Sarah kept from screaming by reminding herself that no one knew what she had been through, so they could be excused for not trusting her change of attitude.

Then came the remarks about Sarah deciding to take the pictures of her mother down from her mirror and packing away her "junk" into separate boxes for Toby, storage, and thrift stores. Irene providing her approval of Sarah "finally getting her head from the clouds" and "maybe now that she is grounded she could get a date," with her dad standing silent behind Irene.

Then, finally, Saturday came again. While Sarah had resigned herself against being an actress after learning the power of words (a line from a story stole her brother away, Sarah would not risk it happening again), her small group of friends had been planning this show for months. They had reserved the pavilion in the square, they had sewn together crappy costumes, begged props off sympathetic neighbors, and practiced as much could be expected of fifteen-year-olds during summer break. But on the morning of the performance as Sarah walked out the door to prepare, Sarah's father and stepmother told Sarah to be back by noon to watch Toby because they were going to the lake.

Sarah did not come back at noon. She did not come back until the sun was setting and approached the house to find Irene standing on the porch with a glare on her face and father just inside, not even looking at her. And as Sarah sat down and listened to Irene tell her again that they "don't ask for much, just that she watch Toby when she doesn't have any other plans", she snapped.

In the Labyrinth, Sarah had learned not to take anything for granted. She had learned that life isn't fair. But she had also learned how to be heard.

"My will is as strong and my kingdom as great," she assured herself.

Then Sarah raised her head to meet Irene's eyes and said, "We need to have a discussion."

She's at the edge of a large crater. Around her, as far as the eye could see, is an empty field. As the sun beat down she watches small beings crack open large, shimmering seeds and sip a single drop from the shell before tossing the rest of the liquid over the edge. They look at her and snicker. They whisper to each other secrets that they make sure she knows she'll never hear.

She ignores them and looks over the side, squinting to see a small pond form and grow as the occasional splash grows into a cascade. The bottom of the crater fills quickly until a lake that perfectly reflects the sky above lies below. A breeze stirs and the smell of peach blossoms drifts from the lake.

All the seeds have been opened and the liquid left inside roll in beads toward the edge of the crater and fall over, on the way down they coalesce until a waterfall is formed, which splashes into the lake below.

The beings scamper to stand at the edge of the cliff. They look at her and giggle before taking leaps into the lake below. She sits to watch them, absently crumbling seed husks and letting the wind scatter the remains across the field.

As she watches the beings seem to have more and more fun. The snide looks and secrets vanish from the games played and laughter becomes more prevalent. They seem to leave something behind every time they emerge onto the shore of the lake.

She laughs as one trips and then another as it tries to help the first up. She squints as neither stand full up again. Did they hurt themselves?

She calls down a question. The squabble of beings looks up at her and waves, inviting her into their game. She's confused, they were laughing at her before, why would they act nice now? The lake must be more fun than she thought. She stands to jump but pauses.

Are they walking on two feet or four? Did they have wings before? The edges of the beings blur in her eyes and their forms shift as she watches them. Did they always do that? It's starting to frighten her but she doesn't know why. The beings are friendly and she wasn't afraid to go near them before but now she can't summon the will to jump.

Her will is strong but she turns her back to the lake and the shifting beings that frolic in it.

 _Come on, feet._

She's in an almost empty field, a small valley with a lake at the bottom behind her and a blank horizon ahead. She's protected from the sun by the clouds that have come with breeze and there is no one she wants to talk to, so she lifts her heels and walks to the sound of rain hitting the ground.


	2. A Meadow

Sarah grimaced across the table at Toby.

The late morning sun hit perfectly to lend Sarah the dramatic lighting she needed to look intimidating and not even the lingering smell of brunch could detract from the fierceness of her glare.

Toby giggled.

Sarah broke character for a moment to laugh along with him before sobering. She contorted her face into another mask of horror: her eyebrow rose and met in the center of her forehead, her lips curled back to bare her teeth, her eyes crossed and widened. Any casual observer would compare her face to a goblin, at least if they hadn't actually seen a goblin.

"… Do you have any plans today Sarah?" Irene's voice broke through the sound of the siblings' giggles.

"Not really. I was thinking about going to the park." Sarah said, "Get out of the house for a bit."

"Well, Robert and I were planning on going out today. Would you mind watching Toby?" Irene asked, for once like it was really up to Sarah, and her father glanced over from the sink to see her answer.

"No, I don't mind, but I am allowed to take Toby to the park, right?"

"I-," Irene cut herself off from her automatic denial and looked to Robert.

"You can. But! Keep a close eye on him and don't stay out too long like you tend to," her father hedged, "I'm leaving $30 here on the counter- if you go out you can stop by the diner and get you and Toby something to eat. The money left over is for you."

Then Robert turned to Irene, "Are you ready to go?"

Irene stood and walked to the counter, grabbing her purse and adjusting her pearls, "Yes, dear."

Together the two walked towards the door, pausing briefly to alternately pat and kiss the two children on their heads. As they exited the house Irene said, "I don't know why she insisted she be paid. It's not like she ever has a date to blow money on."

Sarah looked at Toby in the silence of the house, "What would they have done if I did have plans?"

Toby looked back at Sarah and held his arms up, asking for Sarah to hold him.

Sarah chuckled and stood to walk to Toby. She swung him into the air and around her body before settling him at her hip, "Well at least they asked this time. And I _did_ get paid."

She looked around the kitchen and sighed at what she saw. In a recently developed weekend tradition, the family had gathered for a late breakfast. Sarah might have cast Irene into the role of wicked stepmother but Irene was a wicked good cook. Cinnamon waffles and fluffy eggs along with freshly squeezed juice and perfectly cooked bacon had been a delightful way to spend the morning with her family. However, as wrong as Sarah admitted she was about most of her attitude, some things remained completely unfair: they had left her with all the clean-up.

"Wow. What am I? Their maid?"

Sarah smiled down at Toby and walked into the other room to grab the blanket thrown across the back off the tacky (Irene's style of choice), flower-patterned couch and swept Lancelot up from where Toby had thrown him to the floor. She spread the blanket across the hard tile and set Toby upon it and handed him Lancelot after smoothing back his fur fondly.

She spent several moments tickling Toby, delighting in getting the perpetually fussy baby to giggle. Toby's arms thrashed in his hysteria, waving Lancelot around like a sword against a terrible foe. After several seconds of tickle-torture Lancelot whipped across Sarah's face and Sarah picked up her recently retired role as an actress and responded accordingly.

"Ah! What feat, to strike such a mortal blow!" Sarah fell back and flung her hand across her chest, "Such folly I committed in underestimating such heroic champions!"

She peeked an eye open to glance at Toby, whom played the ever-attentive audience, "To think I, the Great but Terrible Queen I am, shall die at the hands of my once most loyal vassal, Sir Lancelot, and thine of mine own blood, Prince Toby. Oh! The agony!"

Sarah collapsed onto the floor, still except for the occasional twitch of death, as Toby clapped cheerily on the blanket.

"Well Tobes, I better get started," Sarah stood and turned to the table to begin the arduous process of washing dishes. As she gathered the soiled utensils onto a single plate, Toby began to softly whimper.

"Hold on a second, Toby," Sarah placed the dishes she was carrying into the sink and sank down to check on Toby, "I know you're not hungry- Irene just fed you. Diaper?"

After assuring herself that Toby did not have a dirty diaper and seeing that Toby was no longer crying, Sarah went back to clearing the table. Before she had so much as picked up a glass, Toby was crying loudly and reaching for Sarah.

"Ah, I see baby brother. You just want some attention." Sarah smiled at Toby but didn't make any movements toward him, "How about I tell you a story?"

This had been a tradition between Toby and Sarah since his birth. Even before the Labyrinth and Sarah's change in attitude towards Toby, Sarah had been telling him stories. She recited to him stories had she read, stories she adored, stories she hated, and sometimes stories she made up entirely. Weeks ago, when even picking Toby up would make Sarah feel unwanted and hateful, stories were the only comfort that the siblings could share, the only thing that could calm and connect them.

Every time she thought of it, she still felt shame that she used their only connection to wish her brother away.

"So, what story do we want today?" She put her index finger to her chin and made an exaggerated thinking face, "A love story? A tale of magic? A story of adventure?"

Sarah and Toby maintained eye contact for several moments before Toby opened his mouth and blew a spit bubble, giggling as it popped in his face.

"Right! I've been telling you about my dreams, haven't I?" Sarah kept her voice cheerful and dramatic as she tried to spin a coherent story out of the haze her dreams left her with. She told him of the pastel grasses that grew past the tallest man's head and changed colors with every breeze. She told him about the berries that grew in the roots of the grass that glowed even in sunlight and tasted a bit like peach. She whispered about the grass's pollen that made the air sweet but her mind heavy. She extoled the virtues of the river that ran through the boundless meadow, that existed nearby whenever she desired it but never when she didn't. But mostly she told Toby about the people the meadow called for, people who drifted into the meadow but never away.

"… and this funny little man- almost goblin in looks but definitely Hoggle in nature- tore the grass from the ground around him and plopped to sit on the floor. 'I'll tell you what missy- I don't care what you say, I am not sleeping outside.' And before I could even open my mouth, he had weaved himself a house made of grass! In the blink of an eye he had built the cutest house right there in the meadow. But he didn't seem satisfied with it and built another. And another when that didn't satisfy him. He must have spent _hours_ building a town of grass houses, little grass houses with little grass gardens and even grass shops, but he was never happy with his creations. He always seemed happy while making them, but never to have them. When I left his new town and into the meadow again he was still happily weaving new buildings behind me."

Sarah finished the story of her most recent dream almost the same time as she dried the last dish. She placed her father's "World's Best…" mug into the drying rack and turned to Toby, "I'll tell you what though, if I lived in a meadow like that I'd want a house too. No sleeping outside for this lady."

She bent to pick up Toby, Lancelot, and the blanket in one motion, "Maybe a house made out of jewels. Or one made out of clouds!" In Sarah's arms Toby was blinking slowly, his eyes staying closed for longer increments with every blink.

"No, that wouldn't be very comfortable. How about one made out of blankets, eh Tobes? A nice place made entirely out of soft blankets, a giant pillow fort for you to live in?" Sarah placed Toby into the portable playpen set out in the living room, in his arms was Lancelot and placed gently around him was the blanket.

"I, of course, would live in a tree house," she glanced out the window to the tree outside, "No, a tree castle- that I wouldn't have to build myself, so it will actually exist…" Sarah trailed off as she noticed that Toby was no longer awake.

She stared at the sleeping toddler for several seconds, a surge of incredible fondness welling up inside her at the sight. He was safe and happy, and there wasn't a lot she wouldn't do to keep him that way. However, staring at a sleeping baby got boring very quickly- he wasn't even an active sleeper, he just laid there.

Sarah stood up, there wasn't much she could do without waking Toby but she still took the time to look around the room and consider her options. She could watch some television- but she had a tendency to get absorbed and loudly comment on the characters' decisions, she could read a book, or she could write in her journal. Before she could make a decision, she saw movement out of the corner of her eye.

Sarah whirled around, her body tensing for a confrontation and her arm reaching for the lamp at the end of the couch. Her eyes swept from the doorway to the shadowed corner of the room, "Who's there?"

As the seconds ticked by with no answer, Sarah took a step towards where she had seen the movement. From the other side of the room the sound of one of Toby's toys falling to the ground rang out and Sarah again twisted to see what had made the noise. For a single moment she saw a small, grey form and knew.

Goblin.

In a moment of shear panic Sarah snatched Toby from the pen. His eyes flew open and a startled cry emerged from his throat.

Sarah glanced down at the baby in her arms, "Oh. I'm sorry Toby, I-," Sarah cut herself off with a look toward where she had seen the goblin.

She didn't know why she had reacted like that. No one had wished him away and it wasn't the first time she had seen a goblin since defeating the Goblin King and exiting the Labyrinth but still, she was wary. The Labyrinth seemed much more _present_ lately than it had before, the feeling that she was taking things for granted again and that things would be different every time she turned around. It made her feel both exhilarated and jumpy, and like Toby could vanish if she wasn't fast enough, brave enough, clever enough, if she wasn't enough.

So even though she wasn't afraid, even though she was sure the goblin wasn't here to take Toby, she was not going to risk even a moment of inattention.

Sarah continued to gently shush Toby as she pulled the stroller from the hallway closet, stopping briefly in the kitchen to grab the money her father had left, and opened the front door.

As she exited the house she turned back to say, "He can't have Toby. I won His game," she paused to smile, "fair and square."

Sarah closed the door softly behind her, chattering to a sniffling Toby about the fun they were going to have at the park and missed the conversation behind her, "We can't tell the King that!"

"He'd bog us good!" Several heads emerged from behind furniture, some helmeted, some horned, all missing the trademark laughter and musicality in place of a shallow horror.

"We're not even supposed to visit 'the Girl'."

A single, helmeted goblin shushed the rest and said in a screech, "We'll just not tell the King."

Laughter echoed around the room as the goblins disappeared with no sign they had been there at all, "Secret from the King!"

The house stood in silence, the gabble of goblins gone to the Labyrinth to continue without mention of their visit to the Aboveground and the siblings to the nearby park to continue without mention of their visitors from the Underground.

* * *

She's standing in a meadow.

The sky overhead is bright but the gentle breeze and the grass's shadow keep her cool. The grass grows high above her head and through the shifting stalks far figures can be seen. With every step soft blades brush against her skin, calming her and guiding her to where she wants to go.

As she walks, she discovers an adventure past every turn. She drifts past diminutive forms tinkering with effervescent fabrics; 'defensive capabilities' they say, 'a protection against getting lost' they assure. She lingers at the rudimentary stage and the dramatic thespians playing on it; her mind telling her to join but her heart warring against it. She wanders through a village made of grass, a fortress made for comfort, and to a castle built into a tree.

She stands at the roots, staring up into the leaves. She doesn't know what type of tree it is.

She asks herself if she knows and responds, 'It's a spruce tree.' But as she stares she grows hungry and the tree grows fruit, 'Oh! It's a berry tree.' But as she continues to stare the fruit retreats and branches twine down into stairs for her to climb.

'It doesn't matter what tree it is,' she assures herself, 'it's my tree. A my-castle tree.'

She climbs into the tree and sits high in the tallest branch (or is it a tower?) where the pollen lingers thickly and stares across the Boundless Meadow and she doesn't want to leave.

* * *

She's in a castle in a tree.

The sun is low in the sky and casts shadows where there should be none. The light breaks through the protection the leaves grant her and pierce into her eyes. She stares through the branches and sees something move in the distance and she feels curious.

She is walking through the grass. The soft blades slide against her skin, the leaves change with the movement her body introduces and leave a light, waxy residue coating her arms as payment. She can hear laughter and music just beyond the next stalks but she ignores it. There is always laughter and music.

She keeps walking. A sound breaks through the undercurrent of the Meadow. She knows this sound. It is similar to what she finds familiar here, laughter and music, but different. She turns toward it.

There through the grass is a tunnel. The tunnel shifts midway, from the natural colors of the meadow to a brown stone, and jeering laughter echoes with strands of synthetic-pop.

She takes a step toward the tunnel but stops. She can't enter. She's not ready yet.

She turns and walks through the grass again. The tunnel is lost among the grass, for now.

She's in a Meadow and she doesn't want to leave.

She walks through the grass, still laughing at the comedian troupe she left behind. She doesn't remember the jokes they told but she greatly enjoyed them.

She wonders what she will find next.

She keeps walking. She doesn't want to leave.

* * *

"You've been sleeping an awful lot lately Sarah. Are you feeling well?" Her father asked over dinner.

"Hmm," Sarah murmured, she wouldn't go so far as to say she was ill but it had been harder than usual this week to get up in the morning- often leading her to sleep in until noon- and when she was up she was hard pressed to keep her mind from wandering.

Irene and Robert exchanged glances. Typically, it was hard to keep Sarah from dominating any conversation, she had many ideas and little compunctions about sharing them, but that night she hadn't spoken more than a dozen words.

"Maybe Irene and I should stay in and watch Toby tonight," Robert suggested, watching Irene for her response.

Irene looked for a moment like she might argue before she glanced at Sarah, who was shifting her food around her plate and hadn't given any indication that she had even heard her father speak, "Yes, that is a good idea, dear. I'll go cancel the reservations. Sarah, why don't you go on up to bed?"

The entire table sat in silence for several moments, Robert and Irene watching Sarah for her answer and Sarah staring unblinkingly at the floral wallpaper. Toby sat watching his older sister, waiting for her to look at him and play.

"Sarah?" Robert prompted.

Sarah blinked and turned to look at her father in confusion.

"Do you want to go to bed a bit early? It looks like you could use it." Robert repeated to his daughter.

"Oh. Ok," Sarah placed her fork on her plate and stood up from the table, "Goodnight."

As she walked out of the room, Toby finally seemed to realize that his sister was leaving without playing with him and started to cry, calling out for her attention.

Sarah walked to her room without turning back.

* * *

She's in a Meadow.

The sun is bright overhead but the shade of the grass and the gentle breeze keep her cool.

She looks at the flowers that surround her. A garden has grown within the Meadow and it surrounds her in a mosaic of flowers. She finds it prettier than any wallpaper she has ever seen.

She questions to herself, 'who would ever leave this place?'


	3. A Gentle Breeze

She is walking in a Meadow. The grass grows over her head and the sun shines brightly through the leaves. She follows the whimsical parting of the stalks for miles, each shift of direction leading her exactly where she wants to go.

She brushes aside a curtain of grass and overgrown flowers and finds herself in the middle of an argument. Two beings are arguing over a newly sprouted flower. They are hunching over it, blocking the sunlight that flows freely throughout the entire meadow. As she watches the flower, which had been growing strong and seemed to laugh with joy for the day, wilts and begins to shrink into the ground.

The creatures don't seem to notice. "The flower is mine!" They shout, louder and louder with each expression of possession, as if the argument could be decided by volume alone. When shouting doesn't convince either being they turn to shoving and slaps. She can't hear floral giggling any longer. The flower has almost fully retreated.

She doesn't remember wanting to argue. Maybe it was something she liked to do Before, but now she feels like she could be doing so much more. She could be racing with the group she left just minutes ago, or she could be singing with the tiny monsters she was with… some time before that. Why, she asks herself, am I here, listening to these people ruin a flower?

"The flower is mine," she decides, "In fact, everything here is. And I won't let you have this one but there is always more than _just one_ of almost anything here, you can easily find another."

She wanders over and squats in front of the tiny sprout that is left of the once marvelous flower, "Why don't you come out now?" Light giggles radiate around the clearing and the flower emerges, petals open and welcoming to invite her and her companions to stare into the hypnotic patterns that unfurl.

"I can see why you both wanted the flower," she drags her eyes up to stare at the dazed and cuddling companions, "but I don't see how it would cause such a ruckus."

They don't answer. They sit smiling at the flower and the flower seems to smile back, though it has no face.

"Shoo! I'm trying to have a conversation here," her words are harsh but her tone is gentle. The flower pauses, stopping mid-sway before retreating again into the ground. Out of sight she hears the lulling giggle start again.

She stares at the couple again. Without the flower to distract them they seem to remember their argument and pull away from each other.

She knows why she wanted to be in an argument now. She doesn't like perpetuating arguments anymore but she does like to end them. She will heal this rift between the two Meadow residents. She has played an actress and a poet and an athlete and now she will play mediator.

"Now, don't do that. I'm sure we can find a way to reconcile the two of you," she soothes. The beings in front of her turn to look at her. They say nothing but make a point periodically to glare at the other.

'This will take some time.' But it is fine, she has time to spare and no place to be.

* * *

She is in a Meadow. The sky is almost as vast as the Meadow, dark with the seemingly uniform sweeps of the gaseous edges of the blackholes that make up the heavens. She would find the lack of moon odd if she knew anything outside of the Meadow. She might find staring into the mind-numbing forever above her if she didn't stare at the forever reaching across the horizons every day. She ignores the sky, it is not new or exciting.

She walks through the Meadow. She doesn't stumble in the night because her path is lit by the luminescent blooms that grow, like parasites, from the grass stalks around her. The colors they glow in change with each gentle breeze that flows in the Meadow. She closes her eyes in a slow blink and sees pictures in the dim lights left behind her eyelids.

She opens her eyes and continues on. She reaches a maple tree and slowly climbs the stairs into the castle branches. Her legs get heavier and she falters when she enters the castle. She's so tired.

Here too, her path is illuminated. In the absence of stars, though why she thinks stars are absent when they never existed here anyway she does not know, sap seeps into the gaps of the tree, brightening and dimming, that creates a mesmerizing pathway throughout the structure. She does not pause to admire lighting. Why should she? It is always there.

She trails her fingers along the carved bark of the redwood tree. She is so tired. She shuffles her way to her bedroom and does not take a moment to acknowledge the effort that must have gone into the beauty and whimsicality of the room.

She is in no hurry.

* * *

She is in a tent. She knows that it is small and it is striped but now that she is in it she cannot see the canopied ceiling, and the circling lights cause the fabric enclosing her to swirl in front of her eyes.

On thin lines above her, fabric swings dramatically. An ancient, voluminous dress releases itself into a triple flip and hooks into the legs of a full, antiquated military uniform. Off to the side, an empty Greek toga slowly crosses a tightrope, teetering from one side to the other over a filled, inflatable pool sitting prominently, miles below the taunt wire. Gasps ring out from behind her as the toga seems to fall, it is not going to survive. Just when all seems lost, something snags on the corner of the falling fabric and it twists back into place on top of the world.

She looks away toward the ground. There, in the spotlight, a suit of armor makes motions to tame the aggressive quilt in front of it. For a moment she thinks the armor will be swallowed whole and winces her face away. She sees something in the shadows.

Below the towering figures of the armor and the blanket, behind the glare of the light, are the forms of a snarling lion and the tamer battling him. Several feet away she catches a woman holding her arms out and walking along a thin line, and every few second two forms sweep across the entire floor, moving too fast to watch but beautiful in motion.

She raises her eyes to find the figures of the shadows but once again becomes entrapped in the fabric circus. Calliope models dancing to calliope music, drawing her in.

She feels as if she could watch forever.

* * *

She is walking through a Meadow. Every few steps she bends to pluck flowers from the ground and braids them into crowns that she leaves on anything she finds to resemble a face.

She places a circlet of paisley blossoms on the head of a passing dwarf.

She grants the serious looking boulder a coronet of blinking, purple blooms as she sneaks by.

For herself she makes no crown because she does not need one.

* * *

She is playing in a Meadow. She joined a baseball team but she does not know if she is really playing baseball. She does not know whose team she joined. She suspects that no one really does.

She is playing baseball in a Meadow but the grass stretches far above the tallest players head and they want to play baseball not go hunting for a clearing. So, they play.

She hears someone call for a pitch. The grasses around her sway and change with the force of the pitch and swing of the bat. She does not know if the ball hit. But then, no one else does either.

The sound of the batter running the bases reaches her. She does not know where he is running. Where are the bases?

A startled sound echoes into her ears. And she can hear an argument arises as the two decide if the runner had been tagged. No one knows if he is standing on the base. Or if the tagger is even holding the ball. Or what the ball looks like.

"He'll just have to bat again!" She calls from her spot in the outfield. Or third base. Not knowing is half the fun.

She is her room in a castle in a Meadow. Morning sunlight reaches through her windows and illuminates her growing comfort in the room.

Through the generous and plentiful windows, the Meadow can be seen stretching without boundary. The walls are soothing and just the color she prefers. Her bed sits unmade and just rumbled enough to call her to lie in. Small collections from her day lay through the room that she knows she will give away at the next opportunity. While there is not much there- she never feels the urge to carry much back with her- she feels comfortable.

The room is hers. It is home.

* * *

Sarah sat with her eyes closed, chewing on the lackluster meal in front of her.

"- You'll watch Toby for us this afternoon, right Sarah?"

* * *

She is in a Meadow. The sun shines brightly overhead but the lofty grass blocks the glare.

She stands with several beings and shares stories with them. They dramatize stories she had heard Before and stories they had heard Elsewhere. They giggle through fables they make up on the spot. They whisper tales that everyone hears echoing out of the tunnels.

She loves listening to the stories her people tell. She has listened since the beginning and will continue to listen long after but every tale teaches her more.

"And the lil fellow turned his new telescope to the horizon but just as swiftly as he raised it, he had it tucked away and turned to run," the storyteller leans in to draw out suspense, and his long hands flutter in the stillness as they hold the audience captive. The hands draw her attention momentarily. She had listened to this storyteller before but were his hands always like this?

She quickly dismisses the idle thought to concentrate on the story. Why did the explorer, brave by occupation, run? But she can't hear the story anymore.

There is a rushing all around her, static has taken residence in her ears. She looks to the others to question the noise but they continue as if they cannot hear it. They are acting as if the sheer volume is not threatening to split her head and world in half.

Sound vibrates into her very being, stuttering and bursting in an infrequent consistency. Her eyes close involuntarily and her hands rise to cover her ears.

Why is it so loud? She wishes it would just quiet down.

Why won't it-

* * *

Sarah could hear Toby crying from the playpen in the living room. His crying stuttered and his breathing gasped in his chest. The noise was unbearable.

She flipped over in her bed and jammed a pillow over her head. Irene would get him soon but _god_ was she slow today. Sarah peaked an eye open and glanced at her clock. She only had her eyes opened long enough to get the briefest glance at the clockface and used the minimum brain power to guess the time, 3-ish.

Toby was still crying. His howls pierced through the pillows like the cheap cotton they were and kept her awake. Irene should have calmed him by now.

 _Is it too much to ask for a little sleep?!_

"So loud. He is always so loud," Sarah rolled out of bed and shuffled her way to the door. She stumbled down the stairs and paused on the last step to close her eyes. It was summer vacation and she could be sleeping but instead she was woken up by a screeching little monster. She loved Toby but she swears sometimes he cried on purpose.

The noise got louder as she approached the living room, it did nothing for Sarah's burgeoning headache.

Sarah walked into the room and stared at Toby. Toby silenced for a moment, a single blessed moment, before resuming even more insistently, reaching up his arms for his savior, his comfort.

"Toby, be quiet for a moment. What do you want?" Sarah mumbled, she hadn't taken a step past the doorway she stood in. Her eyelids fought separation with every blink. She just wanted to go back to bed but she couldn't until she figured what was wrong with Toby.

Sarah picked Lancelot up from the floor and tossed him in with Toby, Toby's cries ripped through the room. Sarah couldn't think. It was so loud.

Sarah closed her eyes and tried to block out Toby's desperate howls.

"Toby! Shut up! You woke me up for some reason and not even giving me a single moment to find out why! I want to go back to bed. I wish I was still sleeping! I wish you weren't-"

Silence permeated the room and Sarah realized what she had almost done. She knew what words could do.

She felt sick. Sarah's heart beat fast and hard in her chest and adrenaline flooded her senses. She was afraid to open her eyes and discover that Toby was no longer in the room, but if she didn't open her eyes how would she be able to save him.

Toby whimpered and Sarah's eyes flew open. There Toby sat where she had last seen him and Sarah scooped him into her arms and buried his face into her shoulder. His face was sticky with tears and his chest spasmed with hiccups but he was there.

Sarah couldn't understand why she kept making the same mistakes with him. She yelled and scared Toby. She almost wished him away again. Why did she keep getting so wrapped up in her own fantasies that she forgets that she loves her brother?

Sarah did not think she would be sleeping for a long while.


End file.
